Answers for December 2011

ANSWERS for December 2011. A pretty pathetic response – matched I suppose only by my tardiness in getting answers up. No wonder interest is waning … or perhaps there are not many Sigur Ros fans out there … Anyway, when I have time, which as you can see is almost never, I will, by cordial agreement with the Skeptics, be moving the quiz to my own site, where I may refurbish it … or maybe not (now I am very busy, what with typing all these commas,)

,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, <- Spare commas

These 3 are 1 <- Johannine Comma

Enough of this wasted erudition. My WINNER, for this rather thin month, is

John Wilson

Question 1

Those Tibetans blowing their great big alpine horns – why do they always have two?

Answer

So the sound does not stop when they take a breath

Additional Answers

As we all know, Tibetans are insatiable.

Grammar, Dr Bob, grammar! As you probably know, it takes at least two to make a plural. If it was only the one horn, the sentence would read: “That Tibetan blowing his great big alpine horn”. That’s why they have two.

Two eyes, two ears, two nostrils, two kidneys, two balls, two horns… I mean, really, Dr Bob – anyone with the faintest knowledge of the human body could work this one out.

Question 2

Why do you gain especial merit – more than from just the music – when you play the CD “Coming Home” by the Tibetan singer Yungchen Lhamo?

Answer

“Om Mane Padme Hum” is printed on the CD, so the prayer goes off a few times eveery second as you play it

Additional Answers

It is very hard to actually listen to the music as China is currently occupying it. The music itself is not on the CD but exiled to India. So in order to play it one must disregard the CD and just place India into the CD player.

Yungchen’s backing group plays an unheardof three alpine horns per person, a feat bestowing much karma upon the players and, by extension, much merit upon the fortunate listener. It’s a pity that the third horn can only be sounded by inserting it up the player’s backside after said player has consumed a large serving of baked beans & yak butter, but that’s another story. It’s a Tibetan thing, which we westerners do not understand.

Question 3

Sigur Ros were scheduled to play a big open-air concert in Reykjavik in 2007, but in the afternoon the weather looked decidedly bleak. What action did they take to improve things?

Answer

They got the leader of the Icelandic Pagan Church to command the weather to improve – it worked

Additional Answers

During the concert in Reykjavik to avoid the weather they decided to play their music faster, and thus death metal was born.

I’m guessing …. the herring factory? But more importantly, with a population of 2, why did they play there at all?

Revved up and blasted the clouds away with a wall of undifferentiable Icelandic sound!

In the full and certain knowledge that their silence is preferable to their music, they improved matters by cancelling their performance.

Question 4

When Sigur Ros played in Djupavik (population: 2), which building did they play in?

Answer

Disused tank for fish oil

Additional Answers

I note that Sigur Ros use the Vonlenska language, which Wikipedia says “…[lacks] grammar, meaning, and even distinct words” – Molly Meldrum should feel right at home.

According to their DVD – The ol’ Herring factory. Unfortunately the population of 2 turned out to be the original herrings.

The newly constructed 10,000 square metre hall built for the local school (enrollment of 1) through an aid grant from Julia Gillard.

Question 5

Why were some copies of Sigur Ros’s first CD unplayable?

Answer

Being of modest means at the time, the band assembled the CDs and cardboard sleeves themselves, and they got glue on their fingers which transferred to some of the CDs

Additional Answers

Because they were pressed using Iceland’s most abundant raw material, ice. The CDs played ok in icy Iceland but suffered terminal degradation when exported to more sane parts of the globe.

CD players at the time couldn’t understand Icelandic binary.

That’s what my wife says when I attempt to play it!

Are we back to Molly Meldrum again?

Question 6

quiz201112q6

What Icelandic material is this (that produces a musical note when struck)?

Answer

Rhubarb (100 years old)

Additional Answers

Bjork.

Fossilised bullshit

It’s a dried troll penis, which not only produces a musical note when struck but can be used to pick boogers from reindeer noses. Iceland exports thousands of them to the North Pole at this festive time of year.